About the book

A book for people who hate the very idea of self-promotion, Show Your Work! is the followup to my New York Times bestselling guide to creativity, Steal Like An Artist. If Steal was a book about stealing influence from others, Show is about influencing others by letting them steal from you.

In ten tight chapters, I lay out ways to think about your work as a never-ending process, how to build an audience by sharing that process, and how to deal with the ups and downs of putting yourself and your work out in the world:

You don’t have to be a genius.

Think process, not product.

Share something small every day.

Open up your cabinet of curiosities.

Tell good stories.

Teach what you know.

Don’t turn into human spam.

Learn to take a punch.

Sell out.

Stick around.

This book is not just for “creatives”! Whether you’re an artist or an entrepreneur, a student or a teacher, a hobbyist or a professional, it’s time to stop worrying and start sharing.

Praise for the book:

“Some people are natural self-promoters. For others, it’s painfully difficult to put their work out there. In this creatively designed pocket-sized book, Kleon offers the latter group effective strategies that allow them to share their work without leaving their comfort zone…. Kleon’s advice is sassy and spot-on.” —Publishers Weekly

“[The] subtitle could just as easily be, ‘How to Self-promote Without Being a Jerkface.’ It’s an incredibly useful and compulsively readable short book.” —Fast Company

“Like Steal, Show is timeless; readers can return to it repeatedly throughout life and still glean useful ideas and tips. It’s a mistake to think this is aimed at young, artsy people, because anyone starting out (or starting over)… will find upbeat encouragement here.” —Library Journal

“In this motivating book, packed with smart approaches, ideas and quotes, Kleon teaches us how best to navigate through creative work in the present day… A certain and deserved bestseller.” —The Bookseller

“A wise, yet always entertaining, guide for the creative in all of us.” —Largehearted Boy

“Kleon addresses with equal parts humility, honesty, and humor one of the quintessential questions of the creative life: How do you get ‘discovered’? In some ways, the book is the mirror-image of Kleon’s debut — rather than encouraging you to ‘steal’ from others… it offers a blueprint to making your work influential enough to be theft-worthy.” —Brain Pickings

“A must-read for anyone involved in the creative process.” —LibraryReads

“It’s not often that I find myself reviewing a book that I can say has already changed my life…. In one concise chapter after another, Kleon takes on the entire range of assumptions artful people tend to make about their own art-making, launching a good-natured assault on fruitless myths, gently dismantling bootless neuroses and finally offering something that adds up to a new vision of creativity, a manifesto for the imagination’s quest to reach fellow human beings.” —BookPage

“Austin Kleon is one of the brightest new minds on the creative landscape. And Show Your Work! demonstrates why. With simple yet profound insights, and an array of his amazing images, he casts aside old stereotypes of the creative life and tells what it’s really like. You’ll want to share this remarkable book far and wide.” —Daniel H. Pink, author of To Sell Is Human and Drive